Before Super Bowl LVI last Sunday in Los Angeles, viewers tuned in for NBC’s pregame coverage and watched Rodney Harrison’s interview with Rams defensive lineman Aaron Donald. Fans did get the interview, but they also heard Harrison reveal surprising news about what Donald might do if the Rams won the game (which they eventually did):
“If he wins a Super Bowl,” Harrison told Jac Collinsworth, “there’s a strong possibility that he could walk away from the game and retire.”
Harrison appeared on The Dan Patrick Show Thursday and even he was stunned when Donald told him about that possibility in the interview:
“When I had a chance to speak with Aaron, we spent 15-20 minutes. I asked him how many more years do you want to play?” Harrison explained. “You’re at eight. I’m thinking, ‘Hey man, you’re going to play another seven years to get at least 15.'”
“He looked at me and he was like, ‘I tell my teammates all the time but they don’t believe me that if I win this Super Bowl because of how I prepare and how hard I work on my body year-round’ and he mentions his family, he’s accomplished everything so it’s very believable. He said there’s a chance I could walk away. I was stunned.”
At the Rams’ championship celebration parade, Donald talked about possibly coming back next year. Even though Harrison could be the one that breaks the news if Donald did announce his retirement, he would like to see Donald come back for another year:
“I saw him at the parade and he was emotional,” said Harrison. “There’s a lot of emotional type things before you initially win that Super Bowl. Your mind is playing tricks on you. After you win that Super Bowl, your mind is playing tricks on you.
“I would like to see him come back and play because once you walk away, there’s no coming back. You don’t want to sit at home and wish you could’ve done this, could’ve done that. He’s got plenty of time this offseason. We will see what happens.”
As the interview progressed, Patrick asked Harrison if Donald was the best defensive player he had seen, which would be great accolades from a former player of Harrison’s caliber. He said that Donald was someone he ended up having a strong connection to because of the way the pass rusher plays the game:
“I used to say Lawrence Taylor, then I was really, really high on J.J. Watt when he was at the top of his career,” Harrison said. “When I saw Aaron Donald, I saw something different. I saw a guy I could connect with, a guy that I absolutely fell in love with how hard he plays the game, how tough, how passionate he is.”
Maybe that connection could have led to Donald revealing to Harrison that retirement was a possibility. Either way, it led to one of the more talked-about moments that people will remember about Super Bowl LVI.
